Walking Down The Halbeath Road

[DA Baracus]

31 minutes ago, Wacky said:

Strips seem a bit expensive. I wonder if this is this on par with other clubs in the league? 
 

Expensive aye, but no more so than previous years and same prices as most of the league.

[Rob1885]

East Fife punting there's for 50 quid so it seems in kilter.

[North West]

Daily Record:

Dunfermline Athletic are set to sign Kieran Ngwenya.

The freed Aberdeen defender has agreed a two-year deal at East End Park.

Pars boss James McPake has beaten off a number of Championship rivals, including Partick Thistle, to land him.

The 21-year-old will replace Josh Edwards who moved to Charlton Athletic earlier this month.

Ngwenya had attracted interest from Queen’s Park Rangers.

The English Championship side was keen on him for their development squad but he didn’t want to wait and possibly lose out on Dunfermline’s offer.

The Malawi international leaves Aberdeen after four years at Pittodrie.

The majority of his time there was spent on loan with the likes of Cove Rangers, Kelty Hearts and Raith Rovers.

He spent last season on loan at Championship rivals Partick Thistle.

 

[North West]

I'm willing to give the lad a chance, the pish spouted by supporters of other clubs matter not a jot.

[HoBNob]

I'll support any player that plays for Dunfermline. 

 

However in the same sense that you can judge a signing to be a good one, you can judge one to be a poor one. Ngwenya might yet develop into a good player, Edwards certainly wasn't the finished product at 21. But whereas most teams are buying for the here and now, we're once again looking for another day that might never come. 

I'd actually hoped that the Edwards transfer fee would wake up the ownership with regards to how little you will make from player sales in this tier. If they want to make money developing and selling them off we need to be in the Premier. 

[Rob1885]

There's not exactly a plethora of left backs available tbf

[parsforlife]

11 minutes ago, HoBNob said:

 

I'd actually hoped that the Edwards transfer fee would wake up the ownership with regards to how little you will make from player sales in this tier. If they want to make money developing and selling them off we need to be in the Premier. 

Im not even sure if the youth development stuff is motivated to make money, there seems a bizarre 'isn't it amazing for Josh' stuff going around as if they are excited that he's been left the club.

I just get a feeling that might be totally incorrect that if you offered them that in a decade we have players moving down south (or to really excite them to another big nation) every year with this funding sustaining the academy but the first team bounces between championship and league 1 then they would be pretty pleased with that.

 

[DA Baracus]

31 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

I just get a feeling that might be totally incorrect that if you offered them that in a decade we have players moving down south (or to really excite them to another big nation) every year with this funding sustaining the academy but the first team bounces between championship and league 1 then they would be pretty pleased with that.

 

Insane the utter bullshit folk have twisted themselves in to believing.

[parsforlife]

K

6 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

Insane the utter bullshit folk have twisted themselves in to believing.

Knew I'd summon the you with that

[North West]

It is certainly part of the clubs obvious strategy to develop young players and sell them on. Taking on this lad Kieran Ngwenya (if it happens) fundementally isn't any different to taking on Otto or KRH. I think it's a reasonable approach, especially aligned to bringing young guys through the academy. However I'm not sure we'd ever see this type of initiative making consistent enough levels of revenue to cover the associated running costs of the academy. 

 

[HoBNob]

16 minutes ago, North West said:

However I'm not sure we'd ever see this type of initiative making consistent enough levels of revenue to cover the associated running costs of the academy. 

 

Amen. 

The most successful youth academy I've seen at this level was Livingstons and Falkirks, both sold plenty players for plenty of cash but the money from the sales just went back into the considerable running costs of the academy. 

Hamilton had outstanding young players but they didn't sell the players at this level, once you get into the cycle of selling on your best players it's a hard one to break. 

[AuldReekie]

If we're talking the impact on the balance sheet, the ledger doesn't just read 'cost to run academy' and 'income from selling academy players', theres also 'academy players in first team'.

Not saying this makes it any easier but if the academy can produce a couple of players every other season capable of being in the senior squad, those guys are cheaper than going to the market (freeing up budget for other players). Not saying the difference is huge but lots of small gains soon make a difference. 

And on the subject of making little money from Edwards. Rather than being an example of poor return of young players, this demonstrates the importance of not getting ourself in the mess of last season and having to hold onto players longer than we'd like. Had we not been in serious danger, club could have sold Edwards at a far better price than we did. 

Edited Thursday at 17:37 by AuldReekie

[DA-go Par Adonis]

2 hours ago, HoBNob said:

I'll support any player that plays for Dunfermline. 

 

However in the same sense that you can judge a signing to be a good one, you can judge one to be a poor one. Ngwenya might yet develop into a good player, Edwards certainly wasn't the finished product at 21. But whereas most teams are buying for the here and now, we're once again looking for another day that might never come. 

I'd actually hoped that the Edwards transfer fee would wake up the ownership with regards to how little you will make from player sales in this tier. If they want to make money developing and selling them off we need to be in the Premier. 

Ngwenya has played around 90 games at senior level in Scotland. He's not a novice.

I'd be more concerned if we were signing someone with a CV like Holmes or Benjamin.

Edited Thursday at 18:37 by DA-go Par Adonis

[Claudia Gentile]

5 minutes ago, DA-go Par Adonis said:

Ngwenya has played around 90 games at senior level in Scotland. He's not a novice.

Don't forget the cap for Malawi.

[DA-go Par Adonis]

I was there for it.  Solid performance against a tricky Tanzanian side, I'm sure you'd agree.

[Rob1885]

This isn't "one for the future", it's one for now and it needs to be. We'll see if the chaps any good, best of luck to him.

[Chubbychops]

Sounds pretty poor signing going by comments but at least he has age on his side and could well kick on at a club that will play him and try develop him. It's what we do now afterall. Leave the ambition of reaching the top division to the likes of Raith and Livi.

I fear we will never move forward if we are continually spending seasons developing rough diamonds and then selling them for 90k when they become good players years down the line.

We have lost the MFW, MWH and Josh Edwards from a team that narrowly missed the relegation play-offs last year and now we are unable to replace the quality lost from last seasons team, due to neglecting the first team budget for this lala land youth idea.

I think the grand plan is seriously flawed.  The academy is not a case of building it, then it's job done. It will cost hundreds of thousands a year to run, money we won't bring in every year from player sales. We developed Edwards for 5 years and took 90k for him. Were is the 3/400k a year going to come from? Selling a conveyor belt of youth?  It's delusional to think it will happen. I can see us having to monthball it at some point due to finding ourselves in league 1 again as we continue to scrimp on the first team budget.

Feel utterly scunnered with Pars at the moment. Genuinely think we might go down next season.

Negative and depressing post but I'm not going to sugar coat it. I think our owners are going to screw the club up eventually.

Edited Friday at 06:34 by Chubbychops

[Clangers]

Just realised the fixtures are out and unusually the house we booked for our holidays is Friday to Friday for two weeks so we are back just for the Falkirk game. I see that as a great omen.

Actually looking forward to a trip to Methil tomorrow, probably the first time anyone ever thought that, the Scotland performance has scunnered me from TV football.

Also don’t need to be at work on Tuesday night until 1am so thought I would take a run up to Aberdeen, probably go up in the afternoon and visit Dunnottar. 
 

It doesn’t take much to make a lower league fan optimistic but for no reason at all I am surprising feeling so.

[North West]

1 hour ago, Chubbychops said:

Sounds pretty poor signing going by comments but at least he has age on his side and could well kick on at a club that will play him and try develop him. It's what we do now afterall. Leave the ambition of reaching the top division to the likes of Raith and Livi.

I fear we will never move forward if we are continually spending seasons developing rough diamonds and then selling them for 90k when they become good players years down the line.

We have lost the MFW, MWH and Josh Edwards from a team that narrowly missed the relegation play-offs last year and now we are unable to replace the quality lost from last seasons team, due to neglecting the first team budget for this lala land youth idea.

I think the grand plan is seriously flawed.  The academy is not a case of building it, then it's job done. It will cost hundreds of thousands a year to run, money we won't bring in every year from player sales. We developed Edwards for 5 years and took 90k for him. Were is the 3/400k a year going to come? Selling a conveyor belt of youth?  It's delusional to think it will happen. I can see us having to monthball it at some point due to finding ourselves in league 1 again as we continue to scrimp on the first team budget.

Feal utterly scunnered with Pars at the moment. Genuinely think we might go down next season.

Negative and depressing post but I'm not going to sugar coat it. I think our owners are going to screw the club up eventually.

I get most of that, but I'm thinking it will be a much better league from our perspective than last season. If we can bring more players in and hopefully get everyone fit and keep them fit we won't be far away. Regardless of our situation the rest of this league ain't all that, in fact there's all to play for given we're all of an equal level of shiteness.

[HoBNob]

3 hours ago, DA-go Par Adonis said:

Ngwenya has played around 90 games at senior level in Scotland. He's not a novice.

I'd be more concerned if we were signing someone with a CV like Holmes or Benjamin.

I'm not saying he is a novice, but there's not allot to suggest that he's of the quality to be a left back in a title winning side, he might be eventually because he has age on his side, but currently he is not. 

4 hours ago, AuldReekie said:

. 

And on the subject of making little money from Edwards. Rather than being an example of poor return of young players, this demonstrates the importance of not getting ourself in the mess of last season and having to hold onto players longer than we'd like. Had we not been in serious danger, club could have sold Edwards at a far better price than we did. 

Herein lies the problem though eh, the ideal time to sell Edwards was last summer but no player would get sold for money off the back of a league 1 season. 

So next summer is the ideal time to sell KRH, Otoo and Todd providing they have a good season. The drama is a good season in the Championship doesn't exactly get you much either, if you average 200k from those 3 players you've done very well. Likewise Hamilton would also be at his prime selling point next season but a defensive midfielder would be lucky to fetch 100k. 

Considering the prize money available for positions it very quickly becomes not worth it, we're spending however many hundreds of thousands a year on a youth academy and you'll never get the returns while you're at this level. Look at Raith, the Fife Elite Academy closed down so they now don't have a youth set up, they're not paying for all the coaches, the infrastructure etc that comes with it and instead those thousands of pounds can be immediately invested into the first team. 

 

I've seen talk about varying things being an extra expense. By far away the biggest and most needless one is a youth academy. Get promoted, get established and then bring one in. 

 

There has to be a balance of realism and idealism when running a football club, and we do not have that balance right.